Discussing the TNA Knockouts Division (Or A Diva by any other name is still a Diva)

So as I type this column up the first Playboy shots of Traci Brooks are making the rounds of the internet. Wrestling fans of the male persuasion around the world are seaching on google and dissecting them even as I sit here. And that got me to thinking about the TNA Knockouts Division, what once was a place where women's wrestling might have had a chance to thrive is now a cheap WWE ripoff.

Anyone who thinks women's wrestling in the WWE is treated as anything other than a joke is sadly kidding themselves, out of everyone on their roster I can name about two real wrestlers (Mickie James and Beth Phoenix. Nattie Neidhart doesn't count as she rarely is seen wrestling on TV) and the rest are a bunch of pretty faces doing very basic matches to provide tittilation and eye candy for their number one 18-35 male demographic. They have improved though I have to say, the days of bikini shoots and basically softcore porn dvds are over as well as the always classy bra and panties matches. This is probably more due to WWE's shift towards a PG-13 slant but at least they're partially trying, they let a deal that had their divas pose in Playboy lapse and they've booked their titles generally around the strongest wrestlers. A lot of that believe it or not was pretty much due to TNA.

Back in 2007 TNA began the Knockouts division, putting out promos that said they were more about the athletisism of the women rather than them being quote unquote "Barbie Dolls" (Why they centered these around Christy Hemme then is a mystery because when I think althetic womens wrestling, she's not exactly at the top of anyones list). They created a title and put it on one of the best female wrestlers going around, Gail Kim and for a while as they brought in talent like Awesome Kong, Melissa Anderson (Alyssa Flash to the TNA fans) and others they looked for a while like they were going to live up to the hype and for the first time on a national level womens wrestling looked like it was going to be something to be respected.

But things change and opinions change, and TNA ended up doing the same thing every national federation has done with womens wrestling and what every national federation will continue to do in the future. They went back to the lowest common denominator. It all started with the debut of a stable called "The Beautiful People", Angelina Love and Velvet Sky, two gorgeously hot women no doubt and athletically they are competent in the ring but the fact remains, for the first time looks outranked athletic ability and Angelina was pushed to win the Knockouts title.

Since then the whole division has decended into farce, at least up the top, they are still trying down below with hirings like Shannon Ward and Lisa Marie Veron, quite possibly the most underrated female wrestler of the past decade. But a division is only as strong as the person holding the belt, at the moment the Knockouts title is being decided in a fued between ODB (Who, while passable, isn't a real strong choice on looks OR athletic ability, she wrestles power sort of matches and is passable, like a lot of the Knockouts are) and Cody Deaner (Who as you may have guessed by the name is in fact, not female). What once was a respected title is now a joke.

But the final nail in the coffin for the Knockouts division was the announcement that they had signed a deal to have their wrestlers pose nude in Playboy, just like the WWE did so many years ago. At that point in my opinion the whole circle was complete and athletic ability was pushed aside for looks.

Still TNA fans waited with baited breath to see who would be the first Knockout, there were a lot of hopeful candidates. Melissa Anderson, manager/interview/part time wrestler So Cal Val, Christy Hemme, Angelina Love, Velvet Sky, the list went on and on. Then the big announcement came.

Traci Brooks.

And the whole thing pretty much went downhill from there.

Don't get me wrong. Traci has been the longest serving female in the company, she's one of the better female wrestlers they have but....how do I put this delicately. Traci has two looks....or as I would say, she's an Either/Or. She's EITHER a passably attractive woman OR she looks like what would happen if the late Michael Jackson mated with your tupperware set, had a child and THEN that child got smashed in the face with a brick. It got so bad for TNA that Brooks wasn't even put in the magazine, her photos were released in the Playboy Cyber Club, a place that most wrestling fans never even knew existed and even less would sign up to see (They'd wait for the photos to leak like every other wrestler whos ever posed in Playboy)

The current situation both confuses and irritates me, TNA had something going, women's wrestling CAN be a solid key to a wrestling company, stand alone women's federations like SHIMMER have shown us that. Yet it seems that in the end women wrestlers will forever be disrespected on a national stage unless you have a pretty face, a large set of breasts and a tight ass. Maybe things will change, maybe they won't but at the moment the only thing TNA is knocking out is the conception that their women's division is any different to WWE's.